Threat of American Socialism in the Labor Question
The Alliance of July 5, 1879, has this note on the threatening aspect of American Socialism:— “But the labor question presses. Every day brings us nearer to a crisis. Socialism in its American shape is aggressive—it has fangs. There are twenty thousand Socialists in Chicago alone. There is at least one regiment of drilled men among them, and the well-informed say that the armed Socialists in Chicago outnumber the militia. The State Legislature has just passed a law which, properly enforced, will prevent the Socialists from parading with arms again. Their fire-brand speakers have hurled defiance at the law in incendiary speeches. Whether their companies will do so openly, remains to be seen. But whether they do so or not, a collision between labor and law cannot long be delayed in this land of too much liberty.”